He’d destroyed the monster in Ling’s mind. There was nothing to exploit what was about to happen in DC. But even so, the chaos it would cause…

Then Su-Yong’s mind came alive in the space below Shanghai, and smashed down on him in her utter madness.

Su-Yong! He managed to send.

She kept coming, kept coming, kept forcing herself onto him.

And he was completely powerless to resist.

Bo Jintao looked up as the alarms started blaring.

“What?”

Then there was shooting.

A soldier burst into the room.

“Evacuation!” the soldier yelled. “The mob has broken through!”

“Impossible!” Wang Wei yelled.

Bo Jintao jumped to his feet and ran for the door. Other Standing Committee members got there first. He grabbed Wang Wei by the back of the man’s suit, threw him to the side, stepped forward, did the same to Fu Ping, and then he was to the door.

He looked back once, and he saw the chaos in the room behind him, a scrum as Standing Committee members fought to follow. Except one. At the head of the table, still seated, his hands flat on the table, a wry half-smile on his face, and his eyes far away, was Bao Zhuang.

Bo Jintao snapped his face back, pushed through the doorway, and into the hallway. Then he was running down the hall, the way the soldiers pointed.

He heard gunfire behind him. Screams. There was a smell of smoke in the air.

A soldier held a door open ahead.

Bo Jintao burst out through the door into the courtyard, where the vehicles should be.

He saw guards, firing weapons, shooting their machine guns at a tide of humanity, coming over the inner walls, into this thousand year old courtyard, swarming over them.

More gunfire behind him.

He turned to see the soldier behind him fire, fire, fire again into people emerging from within the building. There were flames. Protesters fell from the bullets.

Then one got through, grabbed the soldier. He struggled, pushed the man off. Then another grabbed the soldier, another. They pulled him down.

Bo Jintao turned and ran.

But there was nowhere to run to. The courtyard was full of protesters.

The last thing he saw was angry faces, a forest of hands reaching out for him, dragging him down.

The last thing he heard was his name being yelled, over and over again.

“BO JINTAO! BO JINTAO!”

Then the kicks came, and the mob tore into him.

And there was nothing left but pain.

General Ouyang Fan leaned back, numb.

Zhongnanhai gone.

Su-Yong Shu loose.

Everything ending.

There was no time for paralysis. No time to mourn. That could come later.

He pulled the helmet tight over his head as the helicopter flew, activated his headset.

“Put me through to General Quan Huyan,” he said into it. “Immediately.”

Time. How much time?

He turned to his aide, Colonel Zhu. “What’s the status on the network attack?” he asked.